Dungeons & Dragons: 1st Edition Monster Manual (part 1)
TSR Doesn't Understand the Ocean
The Monster Manual contains a variety of marine life, both real and mythological. Mermen and Tritons share the page with sharks and sea turtles. There is a third category of sea creature covered by the Monster Manual. These monsters are very loosely based on real creatures, but they share pun-infested waters with catfish chasing mice and manta rayguns. These are dangerous waters, but waters the authors at TSR were always willing to traverse.
Zack: Do I need to say it? A seahorse is not a horse living in the sea.
Steve: It sort of looks like a horse.
Zack: Hence the name, but you can't ride one around or feed it a carrot. You can't train a seahorse anymore than you can train a lobster.
Steve: I saw a picture of a crab smoking a cigarette.
Zack: Smoking or holding?
Steve: It wasn't to its lips if that's what you mean. It was holding it in its claw. Let me look on search and see if I can find the picture.
Steve: Oh, wait, here I found a video and it puts the cigarette up to its lips: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbfFrVoc-gY
Zack: I don't even know how to argue with any of this. Crabs don't even have lips!
Steve: It looks like there are a whole bunch of videos of crabs smoking. It must be a real problem. They must do it naturally when they find cigarettes.
Zack: Can we at least agree that Hippocampus is a stupid name?
Steve: Yeah, this looks nothing like a hippo.
